After a fairly lengthy pause I've returned to Mass Effect 2. I was really up for playing this straight after I'd finished the original campaign, but I'm finding it hard to care about what's going on. I've just been reunited with Joker, so I'm hopeful that things will start to pick up with the story and I'll get sucked back in. My plan was to work through this and the third game before next-gen consoles arrive, but no doubt I'll get distracted by a certain game being released on September 17.

My entire thoughts on Beyond: Two Souls cannot be revealed until this coming Tuesday, but I can say it's more Fahrenheit than Heavy Rain which did surprise me a little. I'm a big fan of David Cage's work - despite how insane most of his ideas can go - but they do, I believe, offer something different, even if many see them as glorified point and click adventures (which there's nothing wrong with by the way).

Beyond is certainly his most ambitious work, and what's been achieved here with the visuals is ridiculous for a current-generation console. It makes you wonder how far developers will push the Xbox One and PS4. With all that said, though, Beyond is definitely one of those games where it's near impossible to come to a solid opinion until you see the end credits rolling.

I have no bloody idea why SEGA still hasn't quite got it, but Rayman is exactly what Sonic should be. Legends' combination of speed, rhythm, attitude and sound is precisely what SEGA's mascot should be aspiring to replicate, rather than continue down the prickly path of awkward 2D/3D hybrids.

With that said, I'm still not convinced that Legends is as good as Origins, and two hours in it still hasn't sunk its hooks in as deep as I'd been hoping for. It's fantastically good fun, but I fear that it's lost an element of character in its level and enemy design, and I'm yet to experience a world that leaves me as cheery-eyed as Gourmand Land and Sea of Serendipity. Time will tell, of course, but though Legends may be the perfect Sonic, I'm not sure it's the perfect sequel.

The latest build of FIFA is in the office, and has already been the cause of more swearing than every stubbed toe and missed train in history combined.

It's the usual FIFA fare: accomplished, occasionally satisfying, bastard hard, and pretty much nothing like real football at times. We'll have the full review very soon, but EA has work to do on its hands to make this the gold standard of football games it wants it to be.

11 Comments

User Comments

Ah, man... I feel your frustration. Lost my clan at week six the first time I played thru. Started again, but this time kept my clan small so they were easier to manage, plus kept the really simple challenges ('get 3 downs' or 'get 2 revives' or more etc.) especially for the times when there was a 100% chance of my clan being wiped out.

I stopped trying so much on other challenges that would add survivors to my clan & sometimes just let the 'Dysentery Outbreak' fly by with the very minimum of effort, from myself, so I could cull a few members when my clan was getting too big -- it's a bit *****e on your score & ranking but, like you, I was after those two last trophies for a platinum so I wasn't that arsed.

Torchlight 2, is a game I pre-ordered, but since it was delayed I never got round to playing it until now. I'm having a great time with the game, and I'm playing it on veteran difficulty. That is actually something of a change for me, since whenever a game gives me a difficulty setting I tend to just normal. However, the original torchlight was the first game I specifically played on hard because normal difficulty was such a cake walk, I literally restarted about 5 hours progress to play on hard in order to get a better challenge. And even then I only died once. It's safe to say though that with Torchlight 2, Runic has definitely addressed this issue, and that is great!

Rayman Origins/ Legends. I still need to complete Origins. I originally intended to play it slowly in order to enjoy up until Legends came out. Unfortunately things didn't turn out as planned, so now I have to weeks to complete the 2 games (or at least origins) before I head off to university.

Wonderful 101, is so clichéd it's amazing!! It's not even clichéd in a bad way, but you can tell the developers have taken a lot of inspiration from power rangers (or it's japanese equivalent "Super Sentai") except they have done it so much better. Battles are amazing, combat whilst hard to control at first is super satisfying and overall I'm having a great time! It's a shame the game didn't do so well....

The Last of Us still dominates my gaming. 2 trophies left for the platinum, both online based. Losing all my clan on the final week of the fireflies story was a bit of a setback and I was 44 seconds away from losing my entire clan last night. I suspect i may not get these last 2 trophies.

Max Payne 3: It's a great shooter, great action and visuals with great set pieces and gritty tone, but it's... too much of a shooter? I kept putting it down each day after an hour or so because it gets repetitive. If they had added, maybe some investigation skills or something to break it up, would've been hard to put down.

MGS: Peace Walker: I loved Portable Ops and Peace Walker is a well upgraded version on the same basic formula. Metal Gear games are always fun, and the themes in all of them make you think, and i'm one of those gamers who gets the most out of 'thinking' games.

Mafia II: So PS+ free, and I thought this would be a simplified GTA game, but my god it's so damned linear. And that wouldn't be so bad if the story and characters were good, or the gameplay entertaining. I finally stopped when one chapter revolved around a ***** overplayed Prison Break scenario, and then the next was just driving around watching cutscenes. Do not recommend unless you're really into Mafia history.

Find it funny that ME2 is the highest scored Mass Effect on average, when it's my least favourite of the three, not that it's bad at all, but replaying it is bland compared to the other two.

- Getting the final two Steam achievements in Faerie Solitaire, which I'm quite proud about because not many people have them.
- Starting off the free copy of Magic The Gathering 2013 courtesy of Games With Gold and then figuring out why I never bothered buying it in the first place (it's just not my cup of tea).
- A lot of Borderlands 2, even notched up another achievement by discovering a Tediore Shotgun that for reloading flies towards the enemy continuing to shoot at it, which makes shooting Rakk out of the air whilst reloading nice and easy. And pretty much any other enemy for that matter, so I'm keeping it handy.

Overall quite a casual sub-40 hours of gaming for me, more rewarding was I got to play 'Dad' for a bit and help daughter number 2 towards independence, which left me happy/sad, happy that she's able to look after herself, sad that I'm not needed to look after her anymore. Meh.

I found Mass Effect 2 did get a bit lost in the middle, but it kicks things up a notch towards the end, so worth sticking with. I hope you continue the adventure, Tom, because I'd love to hear your thoughts on 3's ending :)

Rayman Legends is a good game to play. I am enjoying it a lot, I hope David is also enjoying it!

Posted 17:42 on 06 September 2013

essex1212

Quote:

I can say it's more Fahrenheit than Heavy Rain

That's good news as Heavy Rain was boring, full of screen tearing, a plot that did not work properly with multi choice and was the most over rated game of last gen.
Fahrenheit was great though except the last third of it where it goes down hill but the sex scene with the dead body made me laugh.